Psalm 86:11-17 The Message
11-17 Train me, God, to walk straight;
then I’ll follow your true path.
Put me together, one heart and mind;
then, undivided, I’ll worship in joyful fear.
From the bottom of my heart I thank you, dear Lord;
I’ve never kept secret what you’re up to.
You’ve always been great toward me—what love!
You snatched me from the brink of disaster!
God, these bullies have reared their heads!
A gang of thugs is after me—
and they don’t care a thing about you.
But you, O God, are both tender and kind,
not easily angered, immense in love,
and you never, never quit.
So look me in the eye and show kindness,
give your servant the strength to go on,
save your dear, dear child!
Make a show of how much you love me
so the bullies who hate me will stand there slack-jawed,
As you, God, gently and powerfully
put me back on my feet.
The Word of God for the Children of God.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen, amen.
Can anyone truly say that they are slow to anger?
We strive to be slow to anger, but we are all always a work in progress.
It helps when we remember we need mercy and grace every day.
We must all confess that we miss the mark, but I know God is slow to anger.
And when we are angry at ourselves for being quick to anger, we know that God looks on us with an unmatched and much undeserved kindness.
His eyes fill with steadfast love, and He helps us through the mess our anger creates for ourselves and anyone else who is in the very near vicinity of it.
We will so freely admit around others we’re so grateful God is compassionate.
To be compassionate means their is within us an empathy to feel sorrow for someone else’s suffering, with a longing, a stirring desire and effort to help.
We see God’s compassion for us in the person of Jesus Christ.
Through Jesus, we can have forgiveness and salvation.
Our lives change when we meet Jesus so that we can know of God’s great compassion – His compassion helps us live for him alone in our day to day.
There is always an action behind compassion.
As we lean into God’s compassion, we begin to see his actions in our lives.
We experience His mercy when we mess up once again.
We know his grace when he encourages us to fall forward into his arms, and He helps us to have courage to be able to stand again when the floor is all we want.
All through the Old Testament, we see how full of mercy God was to his people.
Then in the New Testament, we see Jesus’s compassion on the crowds.
Jesus delivered his good news of freedom, healed the brokenhearted, and gave sight to the blind of eyes and heart.
From the Old Testament we should recall God’s Prophet Jonah who did not understand the Lord’s compassion for the Ninevites and why he, Jonah should be the only one from God to communicate that message of compassion.
He ranted and raved against God, vowed that he would do everything in his power to avoid fulfilling God’s command, ran away from God’s command and ended up spending three days and nights in the belly of a whale before he finally obeyed God, fervently warned the people of Nineveh of imminent destruction.
The Ninevites repented, and God extended compassion to them.
He did not destroy them. Instead of rejoicing, Jonah thought this was very wrong and in the end He pouted in anger because God was compassionate.
We can learn much from Jonah.
For one, to obey right away.
Second, to remember how much we need mercy and grace.
We are not perfect.
We do not have it all together.
Yet, it’s so easy to look at everyone else’s failings and refuse to see our own.
We want to experience God’s compassion, but do we want everyone even our greatest enemy to experience His compassion?
Truth be told, In our most honest moments, we struggle to say yes.
We want God’s acts of compassion toward us.
We want Him to forgive us, to help us, to bless us.
But when we have been angered, when we have been wounded by someone’s betrayal – as Judas betrayed Jesus, we (humanity) want punishment for them.
If there are 100 people out there who are reading this devotional out there in the world, it is reasonably safe to believe no one can confess that “I am not slow to anger,” and when pressured a tiny bit they struggle to show mercy and grace.
But God. by His living Word, He steps in to our anger and answering our prayers reminds us all that we need His compassion just as much as everyone else does.
This truth from Psalm 86:15 keeps us humble and fully reliant on his grace.
Throughout my Cardiac Rehab struggles I’m prayerful for his steadfast love and His strength to extend compassion when I could be compassionless like Jonah.
First, compassionate with myself to not be so angry at myself for my setbacks.
Second, compassionate towards my wife, family and friends who try to help me.
It’s tempting to respond like Jonah – to get flaming angry, want to run away.
But, maybe Jonah did not fully realize how compassionate and merciful God was towards him in letting him live in the belly of the fish while being guided to the shores of his final destination being Nineveh that he could fulfill his mission.
Perhaps He knew God’s nature because he experienced for himself, but he was slow to learn as he grew angry when God showed compassion to the Ninevites.
People whom in his mind he still believed and still felt didn’t deserve it.
We know the Ninevites gave up their evil and violent ways.
They humbled themselves before God, and He responded in compassion.
But, how much did Jonah actually humble himself before seeing God’s victory?
Humility is key in learning to let go of our anger and to receive God’s strength to extend compassion to others.
The book of Jonah ends with God asking Jonah a question, (Jonah 4) and we’re left wondering what happened to him and whether or not there was any change.
Why did Jonah stay angry?
Why did he still harbor resentment toward God?
Why was Jonah so slow to learn to be slow to anger and abounding in mercy?
Intersecting Faith and Life:
The next time we find ourselves struggling with anger, remember Jonah.
Let him be an example of how not to respond so quickly, so often, with anger.
Jonah appreciated God’s compassion for himself, but he grew angry when God showed compassion to people he felt did not deserve it.
What about us in 2024?
God’s compassion extends to all.
Lean into it and encourage others to lean into it as well.
As we do, we will experience God’s grace, mercy, steadfast love, and strength.
In turn, we will learn to be slower to anger and be quicker to show compassion.
Lord Have Mercy, Christ Have Mercy, Mercy on Me
Psalm 103:7-12 New King James Version
7 He made known His ways to Moses,
His acts to the children of Israel.
8 The Lord is merciful and gracious,
Slow to anger, and abounding in mercy.
9 He will not always strive with us,
Nor will He keep His anger forever.
10 He has not dealt with us according to our sins,
Nor punished us according to our iniquities.
11 For as the heavens are high above the earth,
So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him;
12 As far as the east is from the west,
So far has He removed our transgressions from us.
When Jesus said on the cross, “They do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34), he was teaching us a lot about ourselves – what we do with our anger.
We have an uncanny ability to remain blind to our sin and how deeply it cuts God’s fatherly heart.
But when Jesus said, “Father, forgive them,” he was also teaching us about God.
“Father, forgive. …”
These words go well together because the Bible affirms that, above all else, God is a God of mercy!
“The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.”
As our heavenly Father, it is in God’s very character to forgive.
Again and again, when we come back from the strange ways of our ignorance, our anger and foolishness, we find God waiting for us with a welcoming heart.
He is ready—even eager!—to forgive us when we return home.
God’s heart is not quick to condemn but, rather, to forgive.
“God did not send his Son … to condemn the world, but to save the world through him” (John 3:17).
In Jesus’ plea from the cross, then, we have both the hard brutal truth about ourselves and the glorious truth about God:
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
Thanks be to God that still today Jesus prays, “Father, forgive them,” on our behalf (see Romans 8:34; Hebrews 7:25).
Practice leaning into God’s Compassion – for the sake of self and for others.
In the name of God, the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit,
Let us Pray,
Our Father, which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy Name. Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, As it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive them that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, The power, and the glory, For ever and ever. Amen.
Loving God, Living God, Loving Hope, Living Hope, Loving Living Life His Way! "Many things are possible for the person who has hope. Even more is possible for the person who has faith. And still more is possible for the person who knows how to love. But everything is possible for the person who practices all three virtues." - Brother Lawrence (1605-1691), Practicing the Presence of God (1692). 